When you say it's gonna happen now
When exactly do you mean?
Rings during or shortly after having a strong farm...
Strong farm 2003-2007: Rings in 2004 and 2007
So-so farm 2008-2011: No rings
Strong farm 2012-2017: Rings in 2013 & 2018
Weak farm 2018-today: No rings
When you say it's gonna happen now
When exactly do you mean?
What's different, now, is that the system set up for building a farm is drastically different from decades past. That's one reason you see more and more teams desperately clinging to their best prospects.
No longer can a rich team draft "unsignable players" late in the first round, and then sign them.
No longer can a rich team strategically acquire players that will net them comp picks after they depart.
No longer can rich teams just outspend poorer teams on the International FA Market. (This one is huge.) No more Bogey, Devers, Moncada, Margot, Espinoza, D Hern and other key players on past ring teams or traded for studs used to win rings.
No longer is Henry willing to max out spending year-after-year.
The "old" can never be new again. Those days are gone for good.
When you say it's gonna happen now
When exactly do you mean?
Several of our vets came from our strong farm:
Lester 33 GS 3.75 ERA
Doubront 27 GS 4.32 ERA
Buch 1.74 ERA
Tazawa IFA
Peavy acquired by trading prospects
Ellsbury
Middy had 17 Hrs in 348 ABs
Nava went nutty in '13
Bogey was a key call-up
Iggy contributed
True, the bulk of the biggest players were FA signings, but we needed the players listed above to win it all, too.
When you say it's gonna happen now
When exactly do you mean?
Disagree entirely. The biggest change now is that prospects have become overvalued. I believe there is a prospect market that is going to burst. People can hoard all the prospects they want, but it's just a bunch of lottery tickets. Veteran players are known commodities.
I get your point, and the 2013 season is not a shining example of strong previous farms leading to a ring, but the fact remains, we have no rings when the farm was weak for 2-3 year prior to the ring season. Every ring we have in my lifetime was won during or one year after we had a very strong farm.
When you say it's gonna happen now
When exactly do you mean?